Month: August 2018

I’m a planner. I like to have things put together in advance and thought out. I like to know where something’s going to be and what time, what’s going to happen when we get there or what’s going to be expected of me once I arrive. While I love surprises, I do not like the element of surprise in reference to work or events I am helping with. I like to have all the tools I need available. I want to always be prepared. I don’t like last minute pop ups. I am not a fly by the seat of my pants type girl.

I’ve been put in situations where nothing was planned or thought out and we were scrambling to put things together within a certain time frame. I’ve had moments where I thought I had thought out every detail and missed something so I had to improvise. I’ve helped people with functions they were doing whether it be a birthday party or Christmas party or a business event and there was something forgotten or missing so we had to make what we had work or go back to the store for the hundredth time.

What I’ve come to learn in these situations is that it all came together. It all worked out how it was supposed to. It may have been stressful or overwhelming. There were moments where I would think “What am I going to do?” or “I don’t see how this is going to work out” but it all did. Even with my planning and lists or trying to anticipate the things that could go wrong something popped up that I didn’t plan for and it still worked out.

These moments are a lot like life. Sometimes we get ourselves so worked up over things trying to anticipate the problem and all we end up doing is creating unnecessary stress. And sometimes some of the problems we tried to plan for never even happen or a problem we didn’t anticipate happens instead. But eventually it turns out as it should or sometimes even better than we anticipated!

The point is, in many ways, we are walking through life blind. We can set goals, reach achievements or mile stones. We can create bucket lists or have our lives all mapped out but no matter what we are going to come into bumps in the road. There are going to be road blocks. There will be things we planned for so we are prepared to resolve the issue and then there will be the unexpected. We cannot know everything. We can’t always plan for all the things life will throw our way. And that’s ok!

I’ve learned through life’s hiccups it’s made me more resilient. It’s made it easier in certain situations that when the unexpected happens to adjust accordingly. It’s funny that as parents when our kids don’t get their way we will tell them “You can’t always get what you want” or “Things won’t always go your way” but we neglect to remind ourselves of the same things during this thing called life.

So here’s a reminder that we can’t know it all, we aren’t supposed to know it all and for the things that we won’t have a plan for God will provide the tools,wisdom and knowledge to handle it. Embrace the unknown. There’s so much freedom in not worrying constantly about the outcome of things and watching God bring it all together. After all, not matter what, He’s working all things together for our good! That gives me great comfort and peace and I hope it does the same for you.

your hair color, your mind, your style or anything about yourself and life that you don’t like . Most importantly it’s ok to grow into a different but better version of yourself. For the most part, I am a pretty passive person. For me that word passive pretty much equals people pleasing in the since where I always want those around me to be happy (Although, I have learned that I’m only responsible for my happiness and my happiness alone). I try to be accepting of people’s flaws and I try to be very understanding of whatever it is that they are dealing with. I’m a pretty empathetic person. When those connected to me are going through difficult things I tend to feel their pain, literally it seems. I feel as if I am suffering right along with them although their situation is not my problem.

Because of this personality flaw and strength, (I consider it to be a little bit of both) I tend to take on a lot. I overlook a lot. Ignore certain things. I even rationalize certain behaviors that most would deem unacceptable or give the benefit of the doubt when it’s clear as day what is going on. I know that it’s because I don’t want to rock the boat. I know it’s because I don’t want to make people uncomfortable and I don’t want to argue about something that is not as important to me as it may be to other people. Not that I shy away from confrontation. When something bothers me enough or I feel like it needs to be addressed I have no problem talking about it. But something about me that I know needs to change is my worry of hurting people or upsetting people and doing it at the expense of my own feelings and well being.

Over the years as I’ve grown and learned more about myself I could see and feel the changes in me. Those changes would scare me! Not because they were bad, they were good changes. I didn’t always handle them well or communicate them as effectively as I should have but the changes were necessary to my personal growth. I was afraid that making the changes internally that I needed to make would make people not like me or be angry with me. I was afraid that I would lose connections with friends or friends would not be able to relate to me. While to others it seems like a silly fear, to me it was a real one. I wanted to be better but not at the expense of losing people. Let that sink in for a moment. Too many of us want to make changes in our lives. Too many of us want to be better moms, wives, sisters, friends, etc. but fear losing relationships so at the expense of who we are and who we want to be we’ll delay or stunt our own personal growth. We will hinder or sacrifice our personal well being for fear of being judged or walked away from. But no matter who you are or what you do someone will be upset. So it’s an irrational fear and not worth hindering the changes needed for your own personal growth.

The saying that those who really love you will love you no matter what happens or who you are is not only true but important to people who struggle with this. Relationships can be complicated but they don’t always have to be if at the core of those relationships is love and acceptance. Unconditional love is not loving someone as along as they fall in line with our exact beliefs or what we want. Unconditional love is loving someone in spite of the the fact that we don’t always agree and the other person isn’t always who we want them to be. So don’t be afraid to change. Don’t be afraid to be better. Don’t be afraid to look at yourself and go “I don’t like this about me and I need to work on that.” If it means stepping away from somethings or some people that’s ok. It doesn’t mean it’s the end. It’s actually a new beginning. I have the most amount of respect and admiration for people who know who they are and stand true to that at the risk of people not liking them. It’s ok for people to not like you as long as you LOVE yourself. It doesn’t make you perfect or better than anyone else but it makes you better than the person you were yesterday.

So fight for the changes you need to make and don’t let the fear of losing anything or anyone take away from that. It’s not worth it. But growing into who God has destined you to be will be worth it in more ways than you’ll ever know because you’ll change into a person that you’ll love even if the people you’re afraid of losing don’t……

Ok who does this?!! I dooooo!!!!! While I have gotten better, I still over think almost everything and at times I make a rather simple task or decision really complicated.

If I text someone and they usually respond quickly and it takes 4 hours I’m like “Are they mad at me?” Mind you I haven’t done anything to them so I don’t know why I even go there and then when they do respond I over analyze the text message and I’m all like “Ok they don’t quite sound like themselves…” now in their response they clearly said they were busy trying to meet a deadline at work but I’ve just created a whole argument where there was no issue.

Don’t take me to a restaurant or give me 5 colors to choose from or ask my opinion and have 7 different options. My brain will overload, short circuit and it could take a while to get to an answer. I think-as I sit here overthinking this blog- that over thinking comes from the need or desire to be perfect. We want things to look perfect or sound perfect or want to make the perfect choice when sometimes there really isn’t a perfect choice. There’s just the choice that works for you.

Relax! I often have to tell myself to just calm down, take a deep breath and choose the chicken! Picking food should not be stressful and making a decision should not be solely based on what someone else might deem perfect. Of course it’s understood that with certain things you want everything to look a certain way-such as weddings, birthday parties, or your outfit. But in all honesty what looks perfect to me or you will not always look perfect to someone else. So here we are stressing about how exact we want something to be when someone’s going to look at it for two seconds and go “Oh cute.” And then they’ll move right along.

I remember having a conversation with a friend not too long ago about how I’ll do something and I put a lot of effort into it but it’s not received the way I think it should be. To me it looks great! It looks perfect. But when someone else sees it their version of perfection is not the same as mine so they want to tweak this or change that. And I’m like I don’t get it. This wise friend says to me “It’s not personal. If it’s someone’s vision, their baby, their dream you aren’t going to understand or see it like they will. So remove your feelings from it and just continue doing your best knowing that no matter the outcome it’s not you personally.” In that moment I received so much clarity.

We want what’s perfect for us but it’s not always perfection to everyone else and that’s ok! Stop stressing about it. Stop over thinking the colors or the theme or all the other minute details based on what others might view as perfect cause they just might not see it that way. Focus on what works for you. For me that takes a lot of pressure off and then I stop overthinking things that aren’t meant to be difficult.

Like Forest Gump said “Life’s a box of chocolate, you never know what you’re going to get.” So just roll with it!